Shepards?

Ok...I have totally hit a wall this week in preparing for Sunday. I have been reading and searching through Luke 2 trying to find an angle on the story of the Birth of Jesus that captures the imagination and is creative and blah blah. Feeling a bit frustrated as I know there is a lot there to land on and at the same time not feeling like God has really put anything epic on my heart to share yet.

Yesterday I heard that the Shepards were probably not 20 something guys with nothing better to do than to hang out with sheep but rather they were probably more like 12-14 year olds and their Dad made them do this like a chore or something. Then last night at 9:45 when I was still driving some of the kids home from Jesus Party I started to have an epiphany. A little annoyed with the conversations happening in the car I started to listen a little closer to the 6 12-14 year old boys in my car ramble on and on about the most random things. He did this, she said that, he never saw it coming, ect. Then I made the connection that angels showed up to these clowns. I imagined these kids in a field watching sheep and shooting the bull with each other. Oh, crap! I think I just got my inspiration for what was happening.

Rambling Self Conversations That Are Going Somewhere

Our brains never stop working for very long before the endless streams of thoughts begin to flow in: how do i look, how am i perceived by others, what do i believe, what matters, why should i care, is he or she looking at me, did they notice how hard i tried, do people think i am too intense, is she mad at me, blah, blah, blah, ect.

Our thoughts, the stream of self conversations seem endless.

But what is most essential? I mean I have no clue where i am going with this other than to say that i realize that most of my life is filled with this self talk that begins to shape the way i live my life, how i lead others and what I am saying with the story of my life.

I believe we will live our life out of the overflow of these endless self conversations. It is out of these self conversations from which we will give others advice and direction, and make decisions for our life. So it makes sense that these conversations which are taking place are being shaped in a direction in which we actually want to go.

My Genius Son

Toby blew me away tonight. Sarah was out so I was running solo. They boys were hyper but doing good. I turned my back on them and they ran out of the room happily laughing, but I was getting tired. So I came out and yelled, "Toby-Noah, get back in your room right now or your gonna get a spankin!" The boys continued to run wild around the table and in a moment of weakness as they both were smiling at me I relented from the spanking and grabbed them both by their legs and carried them upside down to their room. They giggled with delight. When we got back to the room I put Noah in his bed then Toby in his. When in his bed Toby looked at me in the eyes with great respect and began to reason with me. He said, "Dad, you didn't need to raise your voice at us. We were just playing and weren't trying to make you mad, ok?" I was kneeling next to his bed completely dumbfounded at how clearly he was communicating to me with not just his words but the seriousness and respect he showed non-verbally as well. Eye Contact, inflection in his words, and it was like he was speaking from his heart to me. What the heck. My kids blow me away.